December 21, 2020
While codes to define new standards of identity are being rewritten, populist authorities still distrust the idea of a diversified coexistence of individuals, inciting resistance in physical and digital realms and spreading confusion about who or what to follow or unfollow. The winter issue of Flash Art revolves around three words that resonate throughout: coexistence, identity, and protest. These complementary concepts function as indices of the dilemmas that affect society today.
We live under a constant barrage of problematic content, yet some scenarios offer relief from saturated narratives. One example is the XVII Quadriennale di Roma, titled Fuori, which presents an alternative to canonical art history. Some of the artists included in the exhibition are part of this issue’s focus: Alessandro Agudio and Davide Stucchi—who conceived the covers of this edition and a visual project in collaboration with Gucci—are interested in the dysfunctional objects that underpin personal identity politics; Monica Bonvicini’s work is similar in that it deeply depends on social codes relating to, for example, housing or femininity. Additionally, there is the viscosity of Michele Rizzo’s performance work, for which “every change in state, every discharge of energy, every movement of matter helps the subject achieve expression, allows the subject to observe the world without and within.”
This issue invites readers to pay attention to the stereotypes that infect our gaze. All the artists and authors featured here are forcing boundaries, trying to imagine a new world in the here and now. William J. Simmons rethinks concepts of ugliness and identification in Cindy Sherman’s work; Adam Jasper points out how Nora Turato’s vision of transectionality is “the flipside of algorithmic marketing models, in which the different identities that people cultivate online start falling into dissonance with each other.”
Also in this issue: Lauren Halsey pushes back against false narratives of South Central Los Angeles. Samantha Noelle Sheppard considers Misha Green’s historical melodrama Lovecraft Country. Shaun Leonardo talks about “passive seeing” with Jane Ursula Harris. Daniel Lopatin a.k.a Oneohtrix Point Never discusses his new studio album Magic Oneohtrix Point Never with Dean Kissick. From the archives, a conversation between Helena Kontova and Giuseppe Chiari, originally published in 1978.
Reviews: Tishan Hsu, Liquid Circuit, SculptureCenter, New York / Harold Mendez, Let us gather in a flourishing way, ICA, Los Angeles / Robert Smithson, Primordial Beginnings, Marian Goodman Gallery, Paris / JUNQUE, Massimo De Carlo, London / Alex Da Corte, Helter Shelter or: The Red Show! or… Sadie Coles HQ, London / Tarek Atoui, Waters’ Witness, Fridericianum, Kassel / Raphael Hefti, Salutary Failures, Kunsthalle Basel / PUSH THE LIMITS, Fondazione Merz, Turin.
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